Katherine Gallagher Poems

Haunting, the way they discovered them —
selves in spiralling night messages —
a web of promises broken, abandoned
under the eye’s disdain: cool words
...

That year you lost your husband
you wore one brave face after another.
Next thing, you kept changing countries.
Making a fresh start, you called it.
...

Already
you have taken the world
by your fingertips
small hands closing on
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It’s that time, mid-autumn: an oil-base blue sky —
pebbles, rocks, a foothold for seagulls.
Clouds buckle, scoop grey on grey, mirror
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Be especially polite,
don’t be alone with them, never kiss them,
my grandmother said. It was simple,
they were God’s chosen.
...

That day Uncle Tom was a hero.
Mostly he was unpopular just for
living with us in the old family home —
taking up space, thinking it was his.
...

The coastline
lies in its lace-edge

its rhythms of itself
...

I have swallowed a country,
it sits quietly inside me.
Days go by when I scarcely
realise it is there. . .
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Polishing my square-toed brogues,
I think about journey, that measure
of breaking out of myself
which never leaves me.
...

Taking
my time to dance
in rhythm with your feet,
I notice that our toes at least
...